Mooching over the Confusion with Avian influenza (“Bird Flu”) Vaccines

The race is underway.

RFK Jr. canceled Moderna's $600 million funding for developing its bird flu vaccine this week. In the final days of the Biden Administration, the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced a $590 million investment in Moderna to accelerate the development of mRNA vaccines for potential pandemic influenza viruses and enhance the platform's readiness to respond.

Moderna were going to develop and evaluate an mRNA vaccine against H7N9 avian influenza in a phase 3 clinical trial. The company also planned to design four other novel “pandemic flu” vaccines.

The funding was in addition to the $176 million the HHS awarded last year to develop and test a pre-pandemic mRNA vaccine against H5N1 avian influenza.

It's challenging to comprehend what the $600 million was for, given that mRNA technology can be rapidly tailored to different diseases or variants by interchanging the mRNA component.

However, we got confused when we read the Mail article about the mRNA vaccine's U-turn. The ar…